Building a Better Blog Community

Technorati Tags: blogging

Over at Firedoglake, Pachacutec offers "7 tips to build a blog community" -- blog community as in the blogosphere, not as in building a specific community blog.

I happen to love articles like this -- practical advice for making a success of something you really enjoy doing. And the "[fill in number] Tips for..." format is easy to digest, and fun to read.

Anyhoo, here is my paraphrase of Pachacutec's 7 tips for building a better blogosphere (not in the same order he listed them). It's really about making your own blog better, so you'll be a more productive member of the community:

Be prolific: You have to write every day, many times a day.

Write extremely well: Engaging, stylish, witty, intelligent -- you know the drill.

Blog with others: Solo bloggers have a harder time generating the volume of posts necessary to build a strong, active, and loyal readership, for obvious reasons.

Think niche: Find an angle, a corner, an information hole, a point of view that others have either ignored or missed. If it's one that interests you, make it yours.

Encourage readers to participate, and nurture that participation: A lively comments section is a must.

Find or create a circle of online friends: It's one of the best ways to build buzz for your blog.

To thine own self be true: If you don't want to blog 24/7, or have the blog everyone talks about, you don't have to. Do what you want.

These are all excellent ideas, and I agree with Pachacutec that, with the inevitable exception(s), it's difficult, if not impossible, to ignore these tips and still have a widely read blog that influences and helps inform and enrich the larger community of bloggers.

Speaking for myself alone, though: easier said than done, especially -- for me -- blogging with others, and developing online friendships. I've always been a loner type; also, putting a team together requires that you be willing to give up some control, and that's always been a challenge for me. Yeah, I'm also the one who never wanted to do group projects in school.

I guess that's where "To thine own self be true" comes in, isn't it?